Part 4

I think that this chapter has a whole lot of nothing in it, haha. It doesn't really move too much or resolve anything, but I promise that the story will soon! I actually split this into two parts and all the action and real things are in part 5 now.

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"They're getting married!" Rory exclaimed to Logan over the phone.

"Who is?" he asked.

"My mother. And Luke. They're getting married."

"Oh, hey, that's great," Logan said.

"No it's not! I mean, it is. It's great for them. But it's not great because they didn't tell me."

"What do you mean they didn't tell you?"

"I saw the ring at the trial," she told him. "My mom hasn't told me yet."

"Ouch," Logan said with a frown.

"I know. It's not just that she's getting married, she's getting married to Luke," she stated.

"Now Luke is the second one who burst in on us at the vow renewal?" Logan confirmed.

"Yes," Rory agreed. "He's also the one who was at the trial with my mom."

"Oh, right." He thought about what Rory was telling him for a few moments. "She'll tell you soon. It's just because of the way things are between you and her right now."

"But you don't understand. This is my mother. We're not just mother and daughter, we're best friends." Rory sighed sadly. "I would normally be the first one she would tell the news to, like, five seconds after it happened. And now she hasn't even told me and who knows how long she's been engaged?"

"Calm down."

"I just, I can't believe it. And not only that she didn't tell me right away, but because it's Luke."

"I gather from the way you speak of him that the fact that she's marrying Luke is big."

"Yes, yes, it's big! It's huge. I mean, she and Luke have been friends forever, Luke's always been there for her… and for me, too. And they are so happy together and when they broke up she was so devastated and I'm just so glad they've made it."

"I'm sorry," Logan told her.

She sighed. "It's okay. I mean, I understand why she didn't run to me to tell me, and it's probably mostly my fault. But it still hurts. And I'm not placing the cause of the hurt on her, it's just that I realize we're drifting and how serious this little rift is. That hurts."

"Everything will work out, Ace."

"I hope so," she said. "I miss her."

"I know you do," Logan said. "But things will work out. Just give it time."

Rory sighed. "Yeah, you're right."

"Hey Rory?" he asked.

She perked up noticing he used her name. "Hmm?"

"Are you sure this dropping out of Yale thing was a good idea?"

Rory sighed. "Logan…"

"It's just that I know my father and I know he can be a jerk."

"That doesn't mean that he wasn't right."

"Well, I don't think he was right," Logan told her. "You know that, right?"

Rory looked down at the floor. "Well, no… not really."

"Well I don't. I think he's wrong. Completely. You can do this."

"I don't know," Rory said with a sigh. "I want to do it, I wish I could do it, I want to go back to… I want to do it."

"Want to go back to where?"

"Nothing, I just meant that I wish I could do it, but I can't."

"Okay, but still, leaving Yale?"

"You did it. You left for a year, so why is it right for you and wrong for me?"

"Because I'm not focused like you are. I don't have a dream like you do."

"I don't have a dream anymore, either," Rory said. "I have to go." She hung up and sighed, looking at the books on her bookshelf before pulling one off and taking it to her bed to read.

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Lorelai stood in front of the door of the pool house.

She had been there for a few minutes now. Three minutes and twenty-seven seconds, to be exact. She glanced at her watch again and sighed. She raised her hand to knock on the door, only because she was afraid of being discovered by one of her parents if she stood around outside for any longer.

The door swung open and Rory appeared, her face sporting a surprised expression.

"Mom…" she stated, holding on to the door.

"Hey," Lorelai replied quietly. "How are you?"

"Okay," Rory said softly. "Good."

"Good, that's good. Good," Lorelai replied nervously.

"You want to come in?" Rory asked, stepping aside in case Lorelai accepted the offer.

"Oh, yeah, sure," Lorelai said, stepping inside and looking around and Rory's things scattered around the pool house. "I, uh, I came to talk to you," she finally explained. "I have to tell you something."

"You and Luke are engaged," Rory stated softly, looking down at the carpet.

Lorelai looked at her in surprise. "You know?"

Rory nodded a bit sadly. "I saw the ring," she said, looking up to look right at Lorelai's left hand, "at the trial. I saw you had it around your neck and I thought that was suspicious. Then later I was looking for the bathroom and I saw you hugging Luke and your hand, well, the ring was on it by then."

"Oh," Lorelai realized, looking away from Rory. "I'm sorry. I wanted to tell you myself, I didn't mean for you to find out that way."

Rory shrugged. "It's okay. Things are weird right now, so what could you do?"

Lorelai nodded. "Right. Sure."

"Can I see it?" Rory asked timidly.

"What?"

She laughed. "The ring."

"Oh!" Lorelai realized, and held out her hand for Rory to take so she could examine the ring up close.

"Oh, Mom, it's beautiful," Rory said with a sigh, suddenly forgetting all the tension and the weirdness of the situation with her mother.

"It was his mother's."

"Aww, wow," Rory said, impressed. She examined the ring for a moment longer before letting go of her mother's hand to look up at her. "How'd he do it?"

"Do what?"

"Propose!" Under normal circumstances Rory would crack a joke about Lorelai being slow and not getting things, but she didn't think that was a good idea right now.

"He didn't," Lorelai said, smiling and letting her guard down a little as well.

Rory frowned. "But you're engaged."

"I know. I did it."

Rory's eyes widened. "You? Proposed?"

Lorelai nodded. "Yep."

"Wow," she took that in for a moment. "Did you plan the proposal?"

"It kind of just happened," Lorelai explained.

"How on Earth does that just happen?"

"Well, I was kind of upset about…" suddenly she remembered the strained relationship between her and Rory, "something… and he was being amazing. I just looked at him and realized that he's there. He's always there. He's always the last one there. When everyone else deserts me, he's always still there. And that he'd do anything for me. And for you. And I just knew it was time for this because I love him so unbelievably much."

Rory grinned, but the reality of their situation was brought back to her as well. "Congratulations Mom! I'm so happy for you guys." She sighed and spoke softly. "I just wish I had been there to hear about it right after."

Lorelai nodded, remembering why exactly Rory hadn't been there. "Well, I should go," she said softly.

"Okay."

"Oh," Lorelai cringed. "Luke's moving in."

"I assumed."

"Just until we're married."

"Just until?" Rory wrinkled her face in confusion.

"Because then we're moving."

Rory's face turned to shock and she raised her eyebrows. "You're… moving? Both of you together?" Lorelai nodded. "To where?"

"You know the Twickham House?"

"Wow. You're moving there?"

"Luke's always wanted to live in that house if he had a family. And it's a beautiful house, and it's a lot bigger than our… my… house, so you know, if I ever start craving apples again…"

Rory took all this in and simply nodded dully. "Oh."

Lorelai watched her reaction. "Are you okay with all this? Because if you're not…"

Rory waved her off. "Oh, yeah, yeah, sure. I mean, it's great. And, you know, it's not like I can expect you not to move when I'm moving all over the place. Besides, it's good for you and Luke. I was just taken by surprise."

"Right. Good." They both stood in silence for a moment, the tension completely back. "Well, I really should go," Lorelai said. Rory nodded.

"Okay. See you… or… well, see you later."

"Later," Lorelai agreed, going to the door and letting herself out. She looked at the door that closed behind her and sighed. At least Rory had seemed happy and okay with everything.

She was barely five feet from the door when her mother cornered her.

"Lorelai!"

She cringed. Damn. "Mom."

"What are you doing here? I saw your car."

"I came to talk to Rory."

"Rory!"

"Yeah. You know. She's my daughter, so…"

"And were you going to come into the house to talk to your father and me?"

She paused as if she was thinking this over. "No."

"Lorelai, you can't just come over here and not--" Emily stopped abruptly when she noticed the ring on Lorelai's hand. "What on Earth is on your finger?"

"Oh. This?" Lorelai waved her hand at her mother. "Hmm. How'd that get there?"

Emily rolled her eyes in annoyance. "Lorelai, really. Are you engaged?"

"Looks that way."

"And you didn't tell us? Just like last time!"

"Well, forgive me, Mom, but why would I have told you under the current circumstances? I get engaged and come running to my parents who have just stabbed me in the back and been nothing but disrespectful to my fiancée to tell them the news? Weird, I didn't think of that idea."

"I'm your mother. You should tell me things like this."

Lorelai rolled her eyes. "Right. Sorry. I forgot."

"Honestly, Lorelai."

"I'm sorry, I didn't think you'd really care, since I know this is what you've been trying to avoid for months now. So I didn't think to tell you that I asked Luke to marry me, forgive me."

"You asked Luke?" Emily asked, her mouth dropping open.

"Yes."

"Lorelai, that's highly inappropriate."

"I know," Lorelai replied with a roll of her eyes, her voice dropping with sarcasm.

"You're a Gilmore, Lorelai. Do you remember that? This is not how Gilmore women conduct themselves, going around asking men to marry them."

"Well, you don't have to worry anymore, Mom. I won't be a Gilmore for much longer. I won't have an important high-class name I can't live up to and embarrass you by possessing and acting the way I act. Bye Mom." She turned on her heels and left Emily standing there, her mouth open in shock.

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"Ta da, the news is officially all over Hartford by now," Lorelai announced, walking into the almost empty diner. "What the hell is up with this?" she added, gesturing to no one being around.

Luke shrugged. "Well. Kirk came in here a while ago and made a scene involving being half naked and burning himself, so I think people decided to stay away for a while." He wiped off the counter. "How'd it go?"

"Well, I told Rory." She took a seat on one of the stools.

"Which was the plan."

"And she was really excited at first and for a few minutes there we totally forgot we have a huge brick wall between us. By the way, she already knew. She saw the ring at the trial."

"Around your neck?" Lorelai nodded.

"Yeah, around my neck and then later she passed by when I had it on my finger and she noticed it."

"Was she upset you didn't tell her?" He placed a coffee cup in front of her and filled it.

"No, she understood, I think," Lorelai answered. "Anyway, we talked about it and everything was good for a few minutes, then suddenly the wall was back. Then I told her about the moving and that totally threw her off, and then things were weird, so I left." She lifted the coffee cup to her lips and took a sip.

"Is she not okay with the moving?"

"No, she is. I think. She just wasn't expecting that, and things are so weird with us she didn't know how to react, and well, the wall was back and just as high as before by then."

"I'm sorry," he said, wincing a little.

"Oh, but then the best part," she said, "my mother found me on my way out."

"Uh oh."

"And she started off by attempting to lecture me on not going inside to visit her and Dad. Then she saw the ring and got mad I hadn't told her. Then she told me it was inappropriate to propose to you and that ending with me leaving her standing there in shock."

He raised his eyebrows. "So, pretty eventful visit."

"Definitely eventful. But anyhow, everyone knows now, so we're good."

"Well, good, I guess." He turned to replace the coffeepot behind them.

"When do you want to get married?" she asked suddenly. He turned to her and frowned. "That was my segue in case you missed it."

"Uhh, well…"

"Because I have an idea."

"What is it?" he asked, narrowing his eyes suspiciously.

"You know how a lot of people get married on anniversaries or holidays like Valentine's Day?"

"We are not getting married on Valentine's Day."

"No, I know," she said, rolling her eyes. "I figured that would be out. But I thought, what if we get married on the anniversary of our break up?"

He frowned. "Aren't you supposed to get married on good holidays and anniversaries?"

"Well, there's no rule."

"Why would you want to get married on that day?"

"I don't know, just to turn it in to something good instead of a bad memory. And, you know, it's kind of like making a statement. Telling that day that it's weak and we've beat it. That day was so, so horrible for me," she recalled, "and so I just thought it would be kind of cool to look back on it a year later and see that even though it was horrible, we made it."

He appeared to be considering this for a moment, staring past her at the door as he thought about it.

"Okay," he finally decided. "Let's do it then."

"Really?"

"Yeah. You're right. We should make it into something good. And it's kind of symbolic to get married on the day you broke up."

"I really didn't think you'd agree," she noted. "Oh my God!"

"What?"

"We have a wedding date. We have a future anniversary."

"Yeah, we do."

"See now, if you had wanted to get married on Valentine's Day, that would've been one less occasion to have to remember. Less gifts, one date to remember. Too bad we already have a date."

He rolled his eyes. "Don't you have an inn you should be running?"

"Oh yeah," she said, getting up. "That darn thing." She smiled at him before leaning across the counter to kiss him. "Tonight we can debate exactly which day we broke up on," she added and was out the door.

She returned to the diner later that night, once she got off work. The normal thing to do would be to go home, but she suddenly hated going home and being alone. Especially when she knew that Luke was going to be living with her soon, she hated being alone even more.

She looked around the diner when she got there and looked to Caesar.

"Hey Caesar." He nodded at her and flashed her a smile.

"Luke's upstairs," he added. She smiled.

"Thanks!" She headed behind the curtain and crept up the steps. She opened the door to his apartment and stepped inside—knocking was overrated—and was about to let it close behind her when she noticed Luke sitting on the armchair, his arm draped over his face. She smiled to herself and let go of the door, keeping it from making any noise, put her purse down next to the door and slipped off her shoes so she wouldn't make any noise and quietly walked over to Luke. Apparently he still didn't know she had come in, so she suddenly plopped herself down on his lap.

His eyes opened immediately and he removed his arm from across his face. He looked at her for a moment with a half glare, half smirk, trying to figure out if he was mad at her for scaring him or happy to see her.

"Pay back's only fair," she told him with a laugh. "You've snuck up on me a lot recently."

He rolled his eyes and shifted slightly, the best he could do with her on top of him. "Yeah, okay, fine."

"Besides, you can't tell me you don't like suddenly opening your eyes to find your amazing, wonderful, gorgeous fiancé."

"I've opened my eyes to worse things," he agreed. She leaned down to give him a kiss. "What are you doing here?" he added.

"What, now I need a reason to come see you?"

"No, I was just… never mind."

She laughed. "I didn't want to go home and be by myself. It's suddenly depressing being at home alone, knowing you're over here and soon you won't be, you'll be with me, but you aren't yet."

He nodded as if he had followed her thoughts. "Right."

She looked around the apartment and noticed he had started packing things. "What are you going to do with the apartment after we move?" she asked.

"What?"

"Well, I'm assuming you're really going to move in with me, unlike with Nicole…" she stopped suddenly, realizing she was going down an inappropriate path. "Sorry."

"It's okay."

"No it's not, I'm sorry. That was wrong on about twenty different levels."

"Forget it," he told her.

"Number one, bringing up Nicole. Number two, comparing our relationship to yours with Nicole. And number three, passing judgment on that whole situation again. And those are just the three that occurred to me already. Go ahead, use the obvious comeback."

"What?" he asked her with a frown.

"The obvious comeback, go ahead, say it."

"I would if I knew what it was," he told her with a frown.

"You say, 'Well I'm assuming you're really going to marry me, unlike with Max.'" He shook his head at her and she panicked again. "Oh my God, that wasn't a good thing to say either. Number one, bringing up Max. Number two, comparing—"

"Lorelai," he cut her off, "stop."

"But…"

"Stop. Relax."

She took a breath. "I'm sorry."

"It's fine," he told her, this time with even more sincerity. "I'll turn it into an office," he added.

"The apartment?"

He nodded. "Yeah. Like it was supposed to be."

"It's going to be a big office," she added. "After the enlarging you did for Jess."

"Well, we can also use it for whatever. Storage or for someone who needs a place to stay or for Rory if she ever needs somewhere quiet to work or, well, we'll figure it out."

"Or for a place to sneak away to during the lunch rush when I suddenly decide to pay you a visit at the diner while wearing my black dress?" she asked with a devilish glint in her eye.

"Uh, yeah, sure, we could try that out too."

She giggled and leaned down to kiss him again. "Fun."

"Hungry?" he asked her.

She nodded. "When am I not?"

"Get up," he said, moving to stand up. "I'll see what we have to eat."

"Hey, when we're married are you going to cook our meals?" she asked, as she brushed her skirt so it didn't get wrinkled and followed him to the kitchen.

"In the interest of being able to eat them, yes."

"Good. Glad we have that settled."

He frowned at her. "Was there ever any negotiating?" he questioned, shifting things around in the refrigerator.

"I don't know. I just thought maybe after we got married you'd suddenly expect me to transform into Donna Reed."

He pulled his head out of the refrigerator and looked at her with a frown. "Well I don't," he said. "Don't change at all," he added.

"Except my name."

He closed the refrigerator and looked at her. "You want to change your name?"

"You sound surprised."

He shrugged. "I just never thought that was you."

"Well, maybe it is," she said with a smile.

"Rory has your name, though," he reminded her.

"Oh yeah," she frowned a little. "Well, she's grown. She's independent. I think she can deal with having a different name than me. Besides, that's how it would have been if she had had her father's name all these years."

Luke shrugged. "True."

"Besides, I already promised my mom that I wouldn't embarrass her by obtaining the Gilmore name for much longer," she said with a roll of her eyes. "It will actually be a relief to get rid of the name that causes me all that grief."

He shrugged again. "You could always hyphenate."

"I could pull a Courteney Cox Arquette!" she said.

He stared at her for a moment. "What?"

"Courteney Cox. When she got married, she added on the Arquette with the intention of always dropping the Cox later and just becoming Courteney Arquette. Though I don't think it worked since she has a kid that's like, what, one now, and still going by all three names. But I could really eventually drop the Gilmore one day. After everyone at work gets used to the Danes being at the end of Lorelai and maybe Rory gets married and changes her own name."

He shook his head at all this information. "Yeah, sure, that would work too," he agreed.

"Or maybe not. I'd kind of just like to change it completely at the beginning. I hate all that confusion about parents having different last names than their kids. When Rory was in school you'd get a message or note from some parent with a totally different last name than their kid, or even a hyphenated one and you'd wonder 'Who the hell are you?" because even when the names are hyphenated it doesn't click right away."

"I'm beginning to wish that I hadn't questioned your decision to change your name."

"So grumpy," she teased, sticking out her tongue. "What happened to the food?"

"I forgot, I don't have much of anything. The delivery was late this morning because some driver quit and so people were ordering things I was out of, so I came up here and used my stuff down at the diner."

"Oh," she frowned. "Well, good thing we're above a diner then, no need to panic!" she joked. "I'll go down and get us something to eat."

"Fine. But don't pay anyone, please."

"Fiiine," she said, making a face, "but only because you're eating the food, too."

"I really hope you see that when we get married there will be no point to paying me. You'll give me money and it will end up right back in our bank account."

"So then, no loss!" she teased. "Heeey, we're going to need new checks!"

He groaned. "I don't like where this is going."

"We'll have to get checks with both of our names on them and then we can pick a design for the checks—"

"I knew I didn't like where this was going."

"… and they can have cute little things on them," she was openly teasing him now.

"Lorelai," he groaned.

"I mean, you can go into Doose's and write Taylor a check with cute little kittens on it. He'll love it."

"What do I have to do to get you to stop talking?"

"Ooh, I think you know how to get me to stop talking," she told him with a mischievous glint in her eye and a subtle wink.

"Food, now, or I may just have to."

She grinned at him. "Only because I'm hungry will I go with that. But later you can shut me up all you want." She teased before slipping out of the apartment and going down to the diner to get their food.

Later that night Lorelai had talked him into watching TV after they had dinner, and she was happily engrossed in a show that Luke could care less about as she leaned against him paying close attention to the fact that he was stroking her hair absentmindedly.

"Can we go in our house?" she asked him finally during a commercial in order to keep her focus as he was stroking her hair.

"Go in it?" he asked, mostly taken aback by the question coming from nowhere.

"No? Oh, I thought it was one of those houses that people go in."

He ignored her sarcasm. "You've been in it before."

"Yes, but that was before it was our house. And there was always a man who claimed he was dying or weird I Love Jesus mannequins around."

He shrugged. "Alright, fine, we can go in it."

"Man, I'd love to tell my mother that we bought a house that I've never even seriously looked at. She would flip. Oh, I should call and tell her, it's too good to pass up."

He laughed a little. "Let's not. I think we have enough conflict in that department already."

She smiled and let her head rest on his chest again, thinking of how much she loved the fact that he had just said 'let's' and 'we.' Man, she was totally gone. Who would've thought independent Lorelai Gilmore would ever be so content not having to be so independent anymore?

"Luke?" she said softly, playing with his hand.

"Hmm?"

"I love you," she said contentedly, letting her eyes close as she listened to the TV.

"I love you too," he whispered into her head, planting a kiss on top of it. "Always."

She smiled and kept her eyes closed. "The town would kill to know that you're really so sweet."

"And we're going to keep it that way," he reminded her.

She laughed softly. "Yeah, yeah. Don't worry Butch."

"Lorelai," he warned at the use of his despised nickname. She just giggled in response.

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"Here we are," he announced when they arrived at their house the next day.

"Wow, this is exciting," Lorelai stated. "Let's go," she said, tugging on his hand and pulling him up the steps.

They got to the doorway and Lorelai went to walk in when Luke stopped her. She looked at him with a puzzled expression, and the next thing she knew she was in his arms. She gasped as he lifted her, then turned to look at him with a grin.

"Why Luke Danes, look at you all old-fashioned."

"I'll put you down if you don't stop right there," he threatened.

"No, no," she giggled. "Carry me over the threshold," she prompted him. He carried her inside, and she laughed as he went to set her down. She placed a kiss on his lips quickly. "That was totally something from a romantic comedy."

"Keep pushing your luck and you're walking over it on our wedding day."

She gasped. "You wouldn't let me."

"Anyway," he said, desperate to change the topic. "Here we are. Living room."

"It's nice," she noted. "It's big." She looked around and took everything in, then followed Luke into the next room.

"Dining room," he stated. "I think."

"Yeah, I think so," she agreed. "And in here we must have the kitchen," she added, walking into the next room which was indeed the kitchen. "Where you will be cooking our meals?" she confirmed again.

"Yes," he agreed. "And you will be staying far away from unless it's to make coffee or eat the meals."

"The only point to the kitchen," she agreed. "Wow, look at the windows, they're huge. I love them." She looked out of one of the windows. "Oh man, this is a backyard people would kill for."

"It is big," he agreed.

"Has Kirk talked to you about mowing that yard? Because I know that's a job he'll be after."

"He has, and I've told him no. Repeatedly."

"And he's still asking."

"Of course."

She giggled. "Man, this is one nice kitchen. It almost makes me want to learn to cook just so I can spend more time in here."

"Family room is this way," he added, leading her out of the kitchen and back the way they came. After checking out the family room, they went upstairs. "There's four bedrooms," he told her. "There's these two," he pointed to two on one side of the hallway, "and a bathroom, and then one over here, and then the master bedroom." He nodded towards a door and she stepped in.

"Oh my God, this is huge."

"It is spacious."

"Luke, this is like the size of your whole apartment before you enlarged. This is huge."

"Too big?" he asked with a concerned look on her face.

"There is no such thing as too big when it comes to bedrooms." She pulled open a door to find a closet. "Holy cow."

"Closets are a good size, too," he added with a smirk.

"I'll say! I might actually fit all my shoes in here even with all your stuff."

"Good luck," he teased.

She abandoned the closet and went to another door. "Our own bathroom," she stated, letting a hand fall over her heart. "This is too good to be true. We'll have our own bathroom. Oh man. We can do dirty things in there."

His mouth dropped open a little. "Lorelai!"

She giggled and stepped closer to him. "Well, we can. Showers in the mornings, for starters."

"Whatever, maybe," he stammered and she smiled at him. "So?" he asked. "What do you think of everything?"

She grinned and looked around the bedroom. "I love everything. Everything is amazing. This house is just amazing."

"Really?"

She nodded. "Really. This is the best thing you ever kept from me," she teased.

"Well, good."

She looked around again and she seemed to be contemplating something. "Wow."

"What?" he asked carefully, trying to read the expressions on her face.

"I'm just so… content. Everything is coming together so nicely and there are so many big changes and so much to be scared of, but I'm not. I'm happy and content. The thought of being married to you and us living here and one day making new people to live here," she said with a little laugh. "Do you know how happy we're going to be?" she added through tears.

He smiled at her softly and pulled her close, kissing her on the cheek. "Yeah. I have an idea."

"Why on Earth did you wait so long for me?" she asked softly.

"What?"

"All those years. There was Rachel and Nicole and… why was I so special? What did I do to deserve you and get to end up with you even though we wasted all that time?"

He looked at her for a moment, as if thinking about his answer. "You're… Lorelai," he explained, and for some reason this answer made her stomach flip and caused tears to silently fall down her cheeks.

"I love you so much," she said, putting her arms around his neck and holding him close. "I can't believe I got so lucky."

"I can't believe it sometimes either," he said quietly.

"What?"

"That after all those years, after watching you go through all those relationships and all those guys who tried to win you back and wanted to marry you, that I was the one that got to end up with you. There was a point when I just thought it would never happen."

"Well it did," she whispered into his shoulder. "It is."

He smiled and rubbed her back soothingly until she pulled away. She wiped at her eyes and laughed a little. "Okay, sentimental overwhelmed time over. Where do we put the bed?"

"Ready to start arguing about that already?" he teased. They walked out into the hallway and he nodded towards a room. "Oh, check that one out. Tons of bookshelves. Perfect for…"

"Rory," she finished for him, giving him a smile to assure he was okay. "Yeah, that's perfect. She can have a room here until she is really on her own, then we can just turn it into a guest room or something. Well, assuming we're using the other two rooms."

"Or we can let it be Rory's room forever."

"We don't have to do that."

"Why not? You know, when our kids grow up and go to college we'll leave their rooms the same way. Most people do. Unless they decide to randomly turn them into gyms or sewing rooms."

She laughed. "Yeah, but still, what if we need a guest room?"

"For who? Rory. She's the person who would be staying here the most."

"Well," she chuckled, "yeah."

"And if we ever have some other guest, they can stay in Rory's room. It can be like those hotels that have a theme in every room. They can stay in The Rory Room."

She giggled. "You are absolutely the greatest guy ever."

He shrugged. "Well, there's probably a few greater than me," he reminded her.

"I seriously doubt it," she told him, still looking around and touching everything. "Like I once told Liz. You're one of the good ones, if not the good one."

"You told Liz that?" he asked with an embarrassed cringe.

She chuckled. "Yeah."

"When?"

"First time I met her," she stated absentmindedly.

"Oh," he realized. "But that was before we were…"

She looked at him and nodded. "Yeah. It was." She smiled at him and continued looking around the house.

She checked out each of the bedrooms and the bathroom upstairs. She stood in the middle of the hall with her hands on her hips as Luke leaned against the wall, waiting for her.

"There is not one thing I don't like," she stated.

"And that's bad?" Luke asked.

"Just saying. Leave it to you to go behind my back and buy a house that I love."

He smiled. "Sorry." She walked over to him and gave him a lingering kiss.

"Heeey," she said with that voice that always made him know something was coming.

"What?" he asked with caution, narrowing his eyes at her.

"We should break in our bedroom," she told him in a whisper, giving him a knowing look.

"We should…" he started out confused. Realization hit him a moment later. "Oh."

She tugged on his arms to pull him away from the wall. "It's calling our names. Or, better yet, it wants to hear us call each other's names."

Luke blushed. "Lorelai," he groaned.

"Come on, it will be fun," she assured him, leaning in to kiss him again. "Promise," she added in a whisper.

"The floor is hard and uncomfortable," he reminded her.

"Yeah, but I think the benefits of being on the floor in the first place will cancel out the fact that the floor is uncomfortable," she told him, raising her eyebrows.

"I don't think so," he told her as she ignored him and pulled him into their bedroom.

"I'm pretty sure you'll get to like the floor real fast," she told him, kicking their bedroom door closed behind them.

xxxxxxxxx

When she got home that night she had eleven messages on her answering machine.

She grumbled and realized that this was why she and Luke should be living together, like, now. She often went periods of time without coming home. She hadn't checked her answering machine all day the day before. She had figured if anyone really needed her, they would call her cell phone.

She pressed play on the answering machine and her mother's voice rang out. "Lorelai, it's your mother. I want to talk to you about your engagem-"

She pressed skip.

"Lorelai, it's your mother again. Would you please call me back? You left very rudely the other day and--"

She pressed skip again. She had almost forgotten that she hadn't dealt with the aftermath of her mother finding out about the engagement and the latest fight she had had with her.

She also suspected that her mother didn't really know what to say to her or want to talk to her. If she had, she would have called her cell phone at some point instead of the home phone. Everyone knew they had a better shot of finding Lorelai by calling her cell phone, especially in the past year after she started spending half her nights with Luke. Even her mother knew this. Her mother could be all high and mighty and disappointed while leaving messages. She could try and make Lorelai feel bad without giving Lorelai the chance to defend herself, and Lorelai suspected that her mother actually liked leaving messages because she could say whatever she wanted without being interrupted. Plus, it would make it look like she was trying to contact Lorelai and Lorelai was blowing her off.

She skipped through the messages until she got to message ten. Her father.

"Lorelai, it's your father. Your mother tells me you have some news to tell us, and that you won't call her back—"

She pressed skip again. This time she wasn't talking to either of her parents. In fact, she thought she was even more angry with her father for the whole Rory situation. She had gotten the impression that her mother was rather unsure about the whole thing and most of it had been her father's idea.

Message eleven. "Hey, it's me," Luke's voice came across the answering machine. She smiled and knew she could listen to one of the messages after all. "I just figured you'd have a bunch of messages from your parents by the time you got home and so I just thought I'd call and leave you a not so angry message. Which is what this was supposed to be. Maybe it's not. Anyway, I better go now. I'll see you later at the diner, I'm sure. I have the coffee after all."

She smiled at the answering machine for a moment even after his message was over.

Yes, she definitely loved Luke beyond comprehension.

"Yeah, you have the coffee," she said with a smile, and headed up the stairs to go get changed for work.

The phone rang again while she was upstairs, but she didn't think to go answer it, figuring it would be one of her parents. After all, they call ten out of eleven times; the odds were in their favor.

When she got downstairs the light was flashing, so she hit play, fully prepared to hit skip any second.

"Hi Mom, it's me," Rory's voice rang out. "I just wanted to call you to, well, I don't know. I guess I just wanted to say hi or talk or something. Make sure everything is good. I don't know. You don't have to call me back or anything, don't worry. I just… I should go. Bye."

Damn, Lorelai thought. Rory had called her and if she had answered the phone, maybe they would have talked. This distance was getting to her and she wished she could end it now.

At least she had Luke.

To be continued…